About the Author

Photo by Jennifer Brommer

I grew up in Sylvania, Ohio, a little suburb of Toledo, where the nearby stone quarries produce some of the best fossil trilobites in the country. I know that doesn’t sound like much to be proud of, but we’re simple people in Ohio. After obtaining a bachelor’s degree at the U. of Toledo, I became a teacher of ninth grade general science in Sylvania, occupying the same desk my high school chemistry and physics teacher used when he tried unsuccessfully to teach me how to use a slide rule. I lasted six months as a public school teacher, lured away into pursuit of a Ph.D. by Dr. Katoh, a developmental biologist I met in a program to broaden the biological knowledge of science teachers. Katoh’s lectures were unlike anything I’d ever heard in college. He related his discipline as a series of detective stories that had me on the edge of my chair. Stimulated to seek the master who trained Katoh, I moved to New Orleans and spent five years at Tulane working on a doctorate in human anatomy. Stressed by graduate work, I hated New Orleans. When Mardi Gras would roll around, my wife and I would leave town. It wasn’t until many years later, after the painful memories of graduate school had faded and I’d taught microscopic anatomy to thousands of students at the U. of Tennessee Medical School in Memphis (not all at the same time) and published dozens of papers on wound healing that I suddenly felt the urge to write novels. And there was only one place I wanted to write about . . . mysterious, sleazy, beautiful New Orleans. Okay, so I’m kind of slow to appreciate things.

Practically from the moment I decided to try my hand at fiction, I wanted to write about a medical examiner. There’s just something appealing about being able to put a killer in the slammer using things like the stomach contents of the victim or teeth impressions left in a bite mark. Contrary to what the publisher’s blurb said on a couple of my books, I’m not a forensic pathologist. To gear up for the first book in the series, I spent a couple of weeks hanging around the county forensic center where Dr. Jim Bell taught me the ropes. Unfortunately, Jim died unexpectedly after falling into a diabetic coma a few months before the first book was published. Though he was an avid reader, he never got to see a word of the book he helped me with. In many ways, Jim lives on as Broussard. Broussard’s brilliant mind, his weight problem, his appreciation of fine food and antiques, his love for Louis L’ Amour novels . . . that was Jim Bell. When a new book comes out, Jim’s wife always buys an armful and sends them to Jim’s relatives.

My research occasionally puts me in interesting situations. Some time ago, I accompanied a Memphis homicide detective to a rooming house where we found a man stuck to the floor by a pool of his own blood, his throat cut, and a big knife lying next to the body. Within a few minutes, I found myself straddling the blood, holding a paper bag for the detective to collect the victim’s personal effects. A short time later, after I’d listened to the cops on the scene discuss the conflicting stories they were getting from the occupants, the captain of the general investigation bureau turned to me and said, “What do you think happened?” The house is full of detectives and he’s asking my opinion. I pointed out a discrepancy I’d noticed in the story told by the occupant who found the body and next thing I know, he’s calling all the other detectives over so I can tell them. Later, we took this woman in for questioning. I wish I could say I solved the crime, but it didn’t turn out that glamorous. They eventually ruled it a suicide.

Forthcoming from Astor + Blue Editions including a brand new Andy Broussard/Kit Franklyn mystery